PhD Studentship - Predicting Reservoir and Wellbore Scaling in Geothermal Developments through Integrated Subsurface Interpretation and Modelling in Newcastle upon Tyne

Award summary: 100% home fees covered, and a minimum tax-free annual living allowance of £21,805 (2026/27 UKRI rate). An additional allowance will be provided to contribute towards consumables, equipment, and travel related to the project.

Overview: Deep geothermal energy has the potential to provide a long-term, sustainable source of low-carbon heat. However, the long-term performance can depend on complex interactions between geology, fluid flow and water–rock reactions. Changes in pressure, temperature and fluid chemistry during production and reinjection can promote mineral dissolution and precipitation, leading to scaling within reservoirs and production wells that reduces operational efficiency. Predicting where these processes will occur is a challenge because they are controlled in part by reservoir heterogeneity.

This project will integrate core observations, wireline logs and seismic data to develop geological and petrophysical models that constrain reactive reservoir simulations. These models will improve predictions of mineral alteration, scaling and long-term reservoir performance while reducing uncertainty in geothermal development.

Specifically, you will:

• Integrate core, wireline log and seismic datasets to characterise reservoir architecture, heterogeneity and petrophysical properties.
• Develop geological and petrophysical models that capture subsurface heterogeneity across multiple scales.
• Constrain reactive reservoir simulations to investigate how reservoir heterogeneity influences fluid flow, water–rock interactions and scaling.
• Evaluate how reservoir heterogeneity affects the likelihood and distribution of scaling within reservoirs and at production wellbores.
• Quantify uncertainty in models and assess the impact on long-term geothermal reservoir performance and development decisions.

The project is funded by Eni S.p.A through the UK Energy Futures research partnership, bringing together geoscientists, engineers, and social scientists to advance geoenergy research across the N8 Research Partnership.

Number of awards: 1

Start date: 4th January 2027

Award duration: 3.5 years

Sponsor: Industry - ENI

Name of supervisor/s: Sanem Acikalin – (Newcastle University), Mark Ireland – (Newcastle University), Tom Reershemius- (Newcastle University), Cees van der Land – (Newcastle University)

Eligibility criteria: You must have, or expect to gain, a minimum 2:1 Honours degree or international equivalent in a subject relevant to the proposed PhD project (e.g. Earth Science, Geology, Geochemistry or equivalent). This studentship is open to those who qualify for Home tuition fees only. If you are not sure if you qualify, please contact pgadmissions@newcastle.ac.uk.